Taking time

Two days ago I had a fall - over the kerb - in the shopping centre car park.  It seemed harmless enough.  Bit of a sore leg and scraped up hand, but no harm done.

By the time I got home, my hand was screaming at me.  Not long later, I couldn't walk on my foot.  The next day the muscle in my leg that I landed on is also in a lot of pain. 

Because of the weekend I am yet to go to the doctor, but it seems I may have either badly bruised the bone in my foot or, hopefully an unlikely scenario, it may be fractured.  Either way, I am incapacitated.  I can hardly walk on either leg, I can't drive, if I don't keep them elevated, the pain increases.

My first thought - "Typical.  Just when I am starting to feel motivated again, just when things are beginning to move, along comes something to keep me down.  Why does this always happen?  And of course, it happens when hubbie isn't around to help.  I can't walk and there is no one to help me.  I'm lonely"  etc. etc.  You get the idea!

This afternoon however, after being fogged in by the devil of my dysfunctional behaviour, I found the fog lifting and I began to see this time as an opportunity for a new vision of my life.  I've been given extended moments of rest to plan and capture how I want to be living my life, the things I want in it, what I want do and what I don't want to do.

And to help me remain positive about this, I was reminded of the last time I did this - after we lost our baby.  Hubbie and I sat down and talked about what we needed to do, what I needed to do.  Time was the first thing and I took time of work.  But then I needed to assess my life and career and work out what I wanted.  Everything had changed.  I had changed.  My old life no longer had any meaning.

I knew I didn't want to teach anymore, but there was one school I couldn't give up.  I knew I loved office work and organising and wondered if I could changed directions into this avenue.  It made sense to try and get work in the field I have worked in all my life, so I put some feelers out in the music office at that school. 

By the last term of the year, I was volunteering and being taught the ropes.  The first step.  Now I am working there one morning a fortnight assisting.  Second step and a big one!  I'm on the books!  The office assistants goal for me is to work there a full day every week and we will gradually get there as the powers that be warm up to the idea.  I did it!  Officework that I love, in a field that I have been in all my life, at a school that I liked too much to leave.

Not only did this plan fall into place, but my plans to do more office work instead of teaching also fell into place in another area.  I have worked for my brother doing his bookwork for the last 15 years.  This year, he asked to come in as office assistant as well and get his paperwork in order.  He hasn't had an assistant in all that time and it's been a HUGE project getting things running smoothly.

It's amazing how all this has happened.  I took some time, stepped back from what I was doing, planned what I wanted to do and, with a bit of initiative and some amazing timing, I am really happy with how things have turned out.

So, I need to see this moment now, in the same way.  It is time to plan.  To let go of some things and to envision new things.  To put in some initiative and then watch things fall into place.  Last year showed me that change is possible.  There is no reason it can't happen again!